Clark Atlanta University Graduate’s Photos On The Way To Smithsonian

By Special to the Daily WorldIt all started over 42 years ago when Palmetto, Ga., native Horace Henry was a student at Clark College in the Atlanta University Center. On Jan. 15, 1969, nine months after the death of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a celebration was held at Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church to commemorate his birthday.

This very first Ecumenical Service, as it was called, happened as a direct result of Dr. King’s widow Mrs. Coretta Scott King making sure that Dr. King’s legacy would live on forever and never die.

Horace Henry, along with a few of his Alpha Phi Alpha brothers at Clark College had made plans to attend the birthday celebration for Dr. King and when they were leaving Brawley Hall, as an after thought, he grabbed a camera and some film to take along with him. This was a period during the Vietnam War, and one of his brothers had sent him the camera from overseas.

The photographs that he took on that day later became a private collection of 11×14 black-and-white enlargements that Henry owns titled “One Day In January.”

The Smithsonian Institution got wind of the collection of prints and contacted Henry to arrange a visit to his home to see the collection. As a result of the chief curator’s visit, the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of African American History and Culture will be taking in the full “One Day In January” collection. These photographs will become part of the museum’s permanent collection.

The projected opening date for the new museum is sometime in 2015 and at that time, people from all over the world will be able to see this historical collection of photographs.

There is also a book available that Henry has published containing pictures with captions from his “One Day In January” collection.

Henry is a 1971 graduate of Clark College and studied at Atlanta University.